The Plays The Thing

Here’s a video I’m going to show in New Zealand of Willie, Hope and friend Mico, from this summer. I’m not going to say much about it, because I am curious what words you would use to describe what you are seeing. Watch it a couple of times, and then if you are so inspired, describe the behavior of the two younger dogs. (Willie is the adult BC, Hope is the medium sized young BC, and the other black and white guy, the smallest dog, is what looks like a BC/Bully breed cross, but his genetics are unknown.) I’m especially curious how you describe a few of the things that Hope does….. Can’t wait to hear your comments!

MEANWHILE, back on the farm: Wheeeee… just a few more days before we go! Lots more to do, but we’ll make it. Can’t wait til the “drive away from the farm with Willie in the window” part is over. Argh, three weeks! Soooooo long to leave him.

While I’m gone I’ll try to post a blog once a week or so. I’ve pre-posted three of them, to come out once a week, and hope to add another each week from down under. I’ll have my cameras with me, so hope to send you photos of NZ. Our first full day there begins with a long walk on a black sand beach with our gracious host and a passle o’ dogs. Oh boy! Then the seminars Saturday and Sunday, which I’m truly looking forward to now that I have them all done and ready to go, and then it’s play play play. Oh my. Stayed tuned, hope to send you some great photos!

Comments

I own a beagle who plays very, very rough, and whose best friends tend to be hound or bully type dogs who also play rough.

Interesting to me was the moment where Hope, who had voluntarily rolled over onto his back, was being straddled by Mico. And Mico is staying on top of Hope instead of play-biting and darting away, and Hope tries to get up and when Mico doesn’t “get the hint” tucks his tail before he finally gets to his feet. I notice that it was after this incident that Hope started charging Mico when he jumped up on Will – but we’ve only got a short clip, so I don’t know if that’s a relevant observation in context?

Other thing I noticed is the moment about 55 seconds in where Mico has been tackled by Hope yet again for jumping up on Will, and it looks like he’s sitting on his haunches and maybe licks at Will’s muzzle before he jumps up again? And then Hope tackles him again.

Will looked a little overwhelmed, gotta say; can’t tell if he was just giving the overexuberant puppy a pass or if he was a bit stressed (or maybe both).

Btw, which puppy was making the snarly noises? Odds are it’s Mico – my aunt and uncle’s Boxer puppy was playing with my beagle the other day; they both love to play rough and tumble and were about the same size, but the boxer snarls like a tasmanian devil!

In my experience, hounds and bully breeds are wrestlers, herding and sighthound breeds tend to be chasers, and a lot of the retrievers and working dogs seem to go either way depending on the individual temperament – some Labs and Goldens love to roll in the mud, and some just want to play ball or keep-away. I can see why bully breeds would be wrestlers, but I’d love to know why the scenthounds and hound mixes all love to wrestle – my beagle is as big a wrestler as any boxer or pitbull I’ve ever met, and his two best friends are both pug/beagle mixes. Their favorite game is headbutting each other and pushing each other in circles like sumo wrestlers until one falls down!

it looks like the 2 bc’s are going all “fun police” about who gets to play with the little one. Luckily, the little one seems ok with that (lots of dogs would get pretty pissy about another dog trying to control its play). All 3 dogs seem pretty relaxed about it.

hmmm…from a layperson’s point of view…looks like Hope doesn’t want the Little Dog to play with Willie? i would say she wants to play with LD herself but am not sure, since she doesn’t seem that keen once he’s actually with her.

will come back to check your comments/response[s] because we have a small dog here that does exactly the same to Georgia when she plays with her [the small dog’s] housemate and am keen to find out what the professionals think! 🙂

I’ve seen my dogs play this way around other dogs. My take on it was something along the lines of jealousy/guarding, and using play to diffuse the redirection. I see it repeated a lot.

Elka is my 3 year old husky mix, and Milton is my year old golden mix. It often goes like this.

Random dog engages Elka. Milton decides Elka is *his* playtoy and he doesn’t care to share her with anyone else, but instead of directly resource guarding Elka, Milton controls the play by mouthing at the random dog and then diffuses his controlling behavior by playing with that random dog. I’ve seen it in reverse, where Milton is the one playing and Elka pulls this stunt – only she’s a little bit more brutal about it and bullies a bit more.

As an offshoot, this happens when I play with the dogs too, I’m not sure if the dogs are after my attention or each others when it happens. But in their eyes, I am not permitted to play with one while the other is present…. unless my Elka is too tired to interfere. Milton always has enough energy to try to control the play/divert attention to himself.

I wonder how wrong I’m getting this, I can’t wait to read some of the other responses.

Was Hope being the play police? I thought I heard a comment to that effect and every time Mico tried to play with Willie Hope would look like he was trying to interrupt Mico or redirect his attention. It is unclear to me whether or not he wanted Mico to know Willie is his or if he wanted Mico’s attention.

I see this type of play a lot when watching dogs at day care. And I think your comment summed it up well…”Hope is the play police”! The little one kept trying to interact with Willie (but it was in a way that was a bit inappropriate. Lots of “over the top’ stuff) and then Hope would interrupt and try and get the little one to chase or wrestle with him. We always debate about how soon we should interrupt the “three’s a crowd” play when we see it at day care, and I’m interested to see what other people suggest. It often seems to end badly.

My take: Willie, who appeared somewhat stressed, was still very tolerant of Mico’s exuberant sometimes “rude” puppy behavior, and repeatedly told Mico that he wasn’t interested by turning away from him.

Mico exhibited what I will loosely and cautiously term “dominant” behavior by repeatedly placing his paws over Willie’s back, which I see as the puppy equivalent of mounting behavior, and displayed loosely the same behavior with Hope when he was straddling Hope and being growly. Mico also attempted a few times to “control” the play by rounding by Hope and moving Hope by means of using his/Mico’s body space.

From what I saw here contextually, Hope was functioning as a referee, trying repeatedly to “school” young Mico in proper behavior by intervening when Mico jumped up on Willie, with Hope becoming more assertive each time Mico jumped on Willie, and finally “body-slamming” him off of Willie.

Just my take, I am not a pro by any means, but love watching and studying dog behavior. I look forward to reading what other readers think! Thank you, this was lovely watching during my morning coffee!

I am not good at reading dogs…Willy seems a little anxious circling the pool at times – like yes I might want to play but not really sure and Hope seems to break in each time Willy and the small dog do play. Hope seems to redirect the attention to him but when the little dog engages, Hope sort of loses interest.

We get something similar going here with my dogs and the dog next door – my female is very protective of our male and when he and his pal play hard, she gets very worried – running in larger circles, darting as Will did a couple times and casually coming in between the two playing dogs, then if our male turns to start playing with our female, the bugger from next door totally intervenes. interesting dynamic. I usually end up putting our female inside after a short play session and let the two males play on their own without her worrying, but she doesn’t relax until her pal is back inside with her, safe and sound. btw, she also comes between me and my male when I clean his ears or give him meds – I have to put her in a sit/stay.

The little pup Mico looks like he’s showing some domineering moves out on Will, and Hope seems to be trying to correct him, whereas Will just puts up with Mico standing up on his neck. When the little guy does that Hope comes running over to nip him. Right about :29 Mico gets Hope down on the ground and seems to get a little intense- it looked like his hackles were up when they stood up as well. I couldn’t quite see what Will did when they ran off camera, but he may have been nipping at Mico which could have been what made Mico react.

Thank you – it is a great exercise to watch video like this and try to analyze what is happening. I did not think Will looked stressed – his tail was in “neutral” almost all the time. He could have left the group but did not, he came back into the zone repeatedly. He seems to prefer running & chasing. Although the little dog did jump up a lot, he was gentle and not throwing his body weight into it. I will guess that Mico was just trying to get/gauge a reaction: how does this other dog want to play? He is a puppy and is still learning. Hope really seems to like the body contact – body slam and full wrestling. It’s rough and probably not the type of play Will would enjoy.

I’m also firmly in the non-expert category, but Hope’s behavior reminds me a lot of my dog Cody, who is a ~2-year-old lab/dane mix. Cody’s “calling” in life seems to be protecting, and at the dog park he will routinely go over to dogs who are playing any rough kind of game, and kind of do what Hope does in this video. I haven’t decided if he’s being the “play police”, or just wanting to join the game… I suspect a little of both. In either case, as Betsy says, it rarely ends well, so I distract him before things get out of hand.

I’m yet another non-expert, but I see this type of play a lot at the park. Puppies often like to jump on Otis’ shoulders in just the way Mico is jumping on Willie. Pretty much all of them do it at some point, even those who begin by being rather shy. Otis’ response is similar to Willie’s. He turns his head and gazes into the distance. If they progress to real harassment, he’ll move away. Seems to me to be a combination of classic ‘puppy license’, tolerating annoying behavior, and a subtle social correction from the adult dog.

Over the course of the past few weeks, I’ve watched Otis ‘train’ a very exuberant, 8-9 month old german shepherd pup using just this subtle signal. Six weeks ago the pup greeted adult dogs like a maniac, jumping and mouthing all over, trying to goad them into rough play. Rather than smacking him down, Otis ‘corrected’ this behavior by freezing (in a confident and relaxed body posture) and gazing right over the pup’s head into the distance. When the pup approached politely and played in a more controlled way, Otis would play, gradually at first, with very inhibited physical contact from Otis’ side, but more intensely as the puppy learned physical and emotional control. If he slipped into puppy crazies, it was back to the freeze out. The difference in the pup’s manners after six weeks is night and day. Otis never physically checked this dog once, but he taught him the limits of appropriate behavior. This behavior is strongly linked to age. Otis does not seem to feel any inclination to ‘correct’ adult dogs, engaging and playing with some pretty hyper individuals. Puppies though, always get the “eeewww…puppy cooties” treatment until they learn to behave like the big dogs.

Otis does not seem frightened or stressed by these interactions…annoyed, at times, but not overwhelmed. He is content in the company of the puppies, if not exactly thrilled. Willie seems a little more nervous than Otis typically does, but I suspect that he is more nervous in general. Still, I wouldn’t describe his behavior as indicating serious distress.

I’ve also seen behavior like Hope’s very frequently among dogs, including Otis, who have preferred or habitual playmates. It almost always means “don’t play with THAT dog, play with ME!” It usually has nothing to do with guarding the dog in the Willie position. The preferred playmate is targeted, even when flailing under a pile of wrestling canines. This is not inherently problematic, but if the controller (Hope position dog) gets too rough or if several dogs are competing over one desirable playmate, it can become overwhelming or annoying for the dog that is ‘it’. It can also be useful, since a dog with a preferred playmate can often be counted on to target that playmate, diffusing a potentially intense situation. I’ve often sent Otis in to distract his 110 lb wrestling buddy from a smaller dog, evening the odds in an unequal matchup without interrupting fun and positive play. I can also send in my brother’s dog to peel Otis off of a group if I’m concerned about him overwhelming his playmates. This kind of behavior can get out of hand, but it is still play behavior.

Dogs are actually operating as the ‘play police’ operate differently, in my observation. They usually start off from outside the play group, not actively engaged in play. They then fly in between actively playing dogs, offering a sharp bark and often a snap, usually directed toward the head, targeting both either or both dogs and offering hard eye contact. They don’t try to engage either dog in play afterwards. The same body language that you see when one dog takes something from another one. It’s dicipline, not diversion. The goal is to make them STOP playing in an excited way. Very small dogs are surprisingly good at this and seem most frequently inclined to do it. Perhaps because the galumphing of the big dogs makes them nervous about being stepped on?

Anyhow, I wouldn’t describe Hope as belonging to this category at all. My take is that he wants to play, and is frustrated that Mico is directing his attention to Willie, who clearly doesn’t want to wrestle with Mico. If Willie had wrestled with Mico, I’d expect to see Hope circle the other two dogs, making occasional feints into the melee to bump or mouth at Mico. If Mico continued to ignore him, I’d expect Hope to increase his intensity, barking or growling and increasing his bite pressure until either Mico gave in and turned his attention to Hope, or the humans stepped in to pull Hope out.

It’s a controlling behavior, but a very common one, and one that is rooted in frustration at being left out, not in possessiveness. It’s a behavior to keep a sharp eye on, because it can escalate, but it is not, in my view, abnormal or unhealthy.

The first words that came to mind when I saw the video were “Uh-oh, Hope is the Fun Police!” He definitely looked like he would knock down Mico whenever Mico would try to play with Willie.

One of my Corgis plays traffic cop a lot, and it seems to come from a bit of insecurity, and/or some confusion about how to participate when other dogs are exuberant about a game and she does not know how to break in. She’s a fairly submissive girl, and I think it’s her way of “protecting” her own area.

I thought it was interesting that Willie and Hope didn’t interact directly with each other. At times, when they crossed each other’s paths running around the pool, it looked like they were trying to “herd” Mico.

I agree with em that this didn’t look to me like what usually think of as “play police” behavior. It looks like Hope wants Mico focused on him.

My interpretation is that Willie is being the typical young boy herding dog – that is, minimally bothered by any of the puppy’s actions, and interested in herding/chasing/being chased. He’s not actively disciplining the pup for its out of line behavior – he’s more interested in running around and in the new playmate.

If Hope were a girl, I’d be inclined to use that as an explanation for his behavior, since girls tend to be dominant. I don’t think his response to the pup is entirely that of “let’s play!” but rather more of a “Hey. That’s not how we behave around here. Learn your place. Specifically, he’s MINE.” I don’t see it so much as a jealously thing as a pack thing. That little puppy is trying to establish itself with the other 2 dogs, who already have an established relationship. Regardless of the Hope/Willie dominance arrangement, Hope is not interested in being submissive to the pup, but the pup wants to be in charge of both of them.

When the puppy had Hope down on the ground the first time, it looked like some unfriendly nipping was going on, with Hope being on the receiving end. And the pup’s hackles looked raised, too, which in my experience means that at minimum, he’s overstimulated and uncomfortable, and either fearful or aggressive. The second time that Hope was on the ground, it looked like her lips were more retracted from her teeth, which should be a clear warning sign to the pup that he’s out of line. I might have tried to introduce one Border to the pup, then put that one inside and introduce the other Border to the pup. Once the individual relationships were established, then would I see how the threesome interacted.

My 3-yr-old Aussie boy had a Boxer girlfriend at the park. They played wonderfully together – they both loved to run run run, and he never minded her wrestling. Then the boxer girl’s owner adopted another boxer puppy, a boy. At first, this was ok, since it was too little to keep up. But as he got bigger and could keep up, the pup started to get a little rough, getting in between Bowser and the boxer girl and snarling/nipping at Bowser. Bowser would just run away and look a little wary when the pup was nearby – I saw a similar expression in Willie’s eyes. The boxer girl tended to stay out of the Bowser/pup scuffle. If the pup came by when she and Bowser were playing, she’d stop playing with Bowser and be indifferent to both of them. The pup would chase Bowser away, and eventually try to hump him, just as in the video. Bowser would take it for a while, then he’d try to dance away from the pup’s advances.

When I started to see the pup’s hackles raising, and the owner seemed to think all was ok, I stopped bringing Bowser to the park regularly. To me, those hackles mean that the dog is grouchy, and I didn’t want Bowser hanging around to get bitten.

I watched 3 times and what I saw most clearly was that Hope would go after Mico almost every time that Will played with him. To me it seems more like Hope was trying to interrupt Will and Mico, so Mico to play with him. Hope did not seem to want to really hurt the little one even though the play was rough. Unless I missed something, I did not see Hope really bite down on Mico. In fact, Mico seemed to get the best of Hope during their wrestling match. The other possibility is that Hope was trying to tell Mico that Will was his and Mico could not have him.

My only question is how long the play went on, and did any of them get over excited and more aggressive like my collie does?

From Hope I noticed a quick play bow toward Mico 5 seconds in, and then I see a lot of Hope trying to entice Mico to play with him and not Will the rest of the video. Popularity contest maybe? I also notice that Hope corrects Mico, when he perceives Mico is out-of-line by jumping on Will.

Will does not seems as intersted in playing like Hope does, but he definitely seems interested keeping an eye on the movement of the Mico and the arrousal level of the play.

And here is my guess/spectulation, but I seem to notice that my younger dog is far more confident around other dogs, when her older brother is around. I wonder if Hope is acting a more confident because his older brother, Will, is around to back him up? Or maybe he is just trying extra hard to compete for Mico’s attention.

Great exercise, and much needed! Since my dog is a locomotive when playing compared to these 3, I really don’t know what’s going on, which is usually how I feel around dogs since I’ve only had one. All I see is dogs running every which way – Willie seems most calm and patient with the puppy and Hope seems to be teaching her not to jump up on other dogs maybe?

It looked to me like Hope wanted to keep Mico’s attention, trying to lure Mico away from Will, and when that wouldn’t work, just diving in and separating them. My snarky Shepherd mix, Sophie, does very similar things.

1. Support for the research of Camille Ward that dogs naturally play one-on-one–three’s a crowd. (see #4)

2. In general, if you watch his style of play, Mico is exhibiting behavior that I categorize as coming from a “status seeking dog.” I know some are uncomfortable with attributing social hierarchies to dogs, but I think this is a good way to describe his continual attempts to mount and stand over Willie, to immediately move on top of Hope and his tail position, which is always up and curled. I’m open to other descriptors.. anyone else have a word or phrase that would convey this type of dog?

3. Willie doesn’t seem particularly uncomfortable to me, except for the times in which Hope barrels in and interrupts things, for example, around second 41. Notice how his mouth is relaxed and open until then, and then he shuts it briefly, immediately after Hope charges in.

4. Hope’s charges could be motivated by a number of things, but it seems reasonable to assume his overall motivation is to stop the play between Willie and Mico. The question is why does he want to do that. In my experience, dogs either are 1) uncomfortable with the noise/movement of other dogs (what em for example called the “play police” or 2) attempting to redirect attention to themselves or 3) protecting another dog. I would dismiss #3 in this example, because Willie shows no signs of discomfort and I also know that Hope also does lots of vertical play with Willie. #’s 1 and 2 are most likely. My guess in this case is that Hope is wants himself to play with Mico, and is trying to stop the play between the 2 other dogs so he can get back into action. However, there is no way you would know this from the video, but at puppy class Hope was clearly overly aroused by the noise and movement of other puppies playing, so that is also a possible motivation. But I’d put my money on PLAY WITH ME as his primary motivation in this context. Hope wants to play with Mico, and Mico wants to “play” with Willie.

(By the way, I’ve been using “play police” broadly, for any dog who stopped play between others, no matter their motivation, but I like em’s distinctions between motivations. Only problem is that it can be hard to tell the difference sometimes.)

5. Some of you noticed (yeah for you!) that when Mico and Hope were playing, Mico began to be highly aroused (around second 28-30). He was on top of Hope, tail stiff and forward, and began “play growls” that got my attention right away because of their low register and the context. A red flag went off in my head when I saw that, and it did in the owner’s. Sure enough, she is working very hard on teaching Mico to inhibit arousal, because as he got older, his play — always him on top, always tail far forward — began to morph into aggression. She is super with him, a perfect owner who is great at prevention and training both, so he is in a great spot.

Every once in a while I’ll post videos like this… I think it’s both fun and informative, hope you do too.

I love your explanation of dogs who are bothered by the noise/movement of other dogs. My female that I mentioned earlier is like that. She plays really well one-on-one with my male Corgi, and they love to play fight/wrestle/ tooth fence and chase. In a large group of dogs competing for tennis balls, she is quite good at holding her own and growl-barking off any dog who tries to run over the top of her. But she definitely does not seem to like when other dogs are playing with each other, and I doubt it’s jealousy.

What is interesting is that she will also try to stop my male Corgi from chasing balls in the house if he gets very excited. If he is wagging and excited and growl-barking while playing, she will come barreling over and persistently mount him, as if trying to stop his play. Being a fairly submissive dog otherwise, she gets confused and quickly loses interest in the mounting behavior, only to repeat it the next time he barrels up the hallway. And yet if I try to redirect her with a ball or toy of her own, she won’t maintain interest.

It’s like she is drawn in by Jack’s high level of excitement, finds the excitement is not directed at her, and becomes confused or mildly alarmed and therefore tries to stop it. Very rarely her efforts will cause Jack to redirect his play at her and she will then join in briefly, but that seems to be almost an accidental result and not her intent. She will sometimes alternately look at me (the ball thrower/kicker) and bark.

This is also a dog who generally will only play with other dogs that she knows well, whereas my male Corgi will jump right into a game with a stranger if they exhibit his preferred play styles.

Oh boy, my dog’s already morphed I suspect. The ways the little dog is playing, I’ve thought of as bossy, not arousal that should be stopped before it turns into aggression. My gets too close to other dogs, stands over them, arm on their shoulder, sometimes mounting them. What is the correct response in these situations? Put the leash on the dog, make her lie down until calm? Anybody?

Rita & Guro: There’s only one second of over arousal in the video, so if your dog is just mounting and standing over, that’s not necessarily a problem. It all depends on how the other dogs respond… some dogs don’t mind ‘bossy’ and just ignore it. No matter what’s going on, I think any dog should have a dynamite recall, or ‘watch’ or ‘leave it’ — we should all be able to stop a play session with just a word or two. That’s a vital part of puppy classes to me, teaching dogs that listening to you means they’ll get a treat, or even better, more play!

All the different observations and interpretations coming from viewing the same video have been fascinating. Please, do provide more of these opportunities. I learned a lot. It’s been an insane few days at my house so I didn’t get the chance to post my observations and interpretations before you did but I’ll add my thoughts for whatever they might be worth.

Unless all three dogs are really solid confident dogs three is an unstable play group. Here Hope wants Mico to play with him and Mico wants to play with Will. Will is enjoying the chase Mico aspect but is not rewarding any other kind of play from Mico. Whenever Mico doesn’t play a game Willie wants Will withdraws his attention and basically treats Mico as if he’s become invisible. I’ve watched Ranger do the same thing with rambunctious puppies, it’s as if he says to them “play nice and I’ll play with you, don’t play nicely and you’ll cease to exist as far as I’m concerned.” Most puppies learn to moderate their play if consistently given this message. Will doesn’t seem to be particularly distressed although I think he would rather not deal with Hope interfering with what he’s trying to teach Mico. If I were anthropomorphizing I’d say that Willie has a specific learning goal in mind for Mico and everytime Hope barrels in and slams Mico aside that interferes with what Will is trying to teach the young puppy and Willie finds the interruptions irritating. I would have liked to see a video of just Willie and Mico and another of just Mico and Hope to compare to the three.

Mico is what I to call an overly confident puppy. He sees himself as the social equal or even superior of the other dogs. With his mounting behavior and his pinning Hope to the ground he isn’t showing proper respect for his elders. My observation has been that puppies with that kind of attitude tend to get themselves in trouble unless checked by either their humans or their dog mentors. Those that aren’t checked turn into unreliable dogs so I’m glad Mico is in good hands.

Play police are in my experience often herding breeds. I wonder if it’s because they have been bred for generations to manage the movement of a flock and the uncontrolled movement that constitutes much of play arouses all those instincts. The threshold where movement goes from acceptable to unacceptable differs from dog to dog but it seems to me that when a dog is being the play police the dog can’t relax until the action has dropped below that threshold. For some dogs any kind of play fighting is fine but running and chasing aren’t for other play police the other dogs can run all they want but the first wrestling move and the police move in. I identify Play police as only being happy if the action drops below their threshold. Other dogs that move in and break things up I call the Nanny types. They interfere in specific play pairings where one dog is feeling overwhelmed. This is the type Ranger generally is. On one occasion a Newfoundland puppy was playing with a Labrador puppy. The pups were the same age so the Newfie was much much bigger than the Lab. Ranger supervised the play and everytime the Lab looked overwhelmed Ranger would distract the Newfie sometimes by enticing the pup to play with Ranger sometimes simply by herding him away and pinning him in a corner for a time out. The amount of time the puppies were able to play together steadily increased as the Lab gained confidence and the Newfie learned how to self handicap better. What I saw on the video was the third type of intervention, the play with me instead. I didn’t see Will looking overwhelmed and Hope wasn’t content when he’d stopped the action he was only content when he had Mico playing with him–back to three is an unstable play group unless all three are very solid confident dogs; an overly confident puppy, a teenager and a not entirely confident adult aren’t going to be all three playing together.

This was a really fascinating exercise. Thank you for providing it. Have a wonderful time in New Zealand. I can’t wait to see the pictures.

I appreciate you posting this video. I’ve been reading your blog for some time and find it very interesting and thought provoking, and you take great pictures! When I watched the video the first time, I immediately thought of my dog who’s play style was a lot like Mico’s when I adopted him @ 6 months old, he’s two now. Although he wasn’t quite as “dominant” with the behavior at first, it slowly morphed into that with play, and now he is rather unpredictable with other dogs. Sigh. I know now that this is my fault for not keeping the behavior in check when it started, but he is my first dog, and I didn’t really understand that it was an undesirable behavior, and when I realized it I didn’t know how to fix it. I’m hoping to read your book “The Feisty Fido” soon to get training tips on how to solve this behavior problem. I haven’t found a trainer in my area that works on dog behavior, just obedience classes that have yet to help me with this problem.

I just played this clip for my 11 year old. When I asked him what was going on he told me that they needed another dog. Just asking him to watch and observe he could tell that three wasn’t a stable play grouping.

Thanks so much for sharing this video! I’m the happy owner of a “status seeking” 18 month old GSD/Golden mix and his play style is very similar to Mico’s. He loves dogs more than air (and food and Kongs and…everything), but won’t tolerate three way play. When he spies an approaching dog on our walks or at the dog park, he plops down, belly to ground. My assumption is he wants to make himself small and not appear a threat. Yet my gut is telling me it’s a ruse. Because when the dog is close enough, he instantly springs up and goes for the over-the-shoulder move. He won’t try to mount right off the bat, but as he gets more and more happy (okay, aroused!) then he tries to mount. He’s a rude, frustrated greeter. And so far we’ve been lucky.

I’m sincerely wondering what makes a dog seek status. And if there’s anything that can be done to curtail it. Our boy exhibits a bit of fear barking during moments of sudden environmental contrast, meaning yesterday there was no one at the bus stop and today there was someone who had the gall to bring a suitcase with them 🙂 So he’s not all that confident. When we got our daycare “temperament test,” it was suggested that our dog was a “first puppy.” Again, meaning that he was the first born of the litter and was the one who got all of mama’s milk and has been demanding ever since. We adopted him at ten weeks and he easily had ten pounds on both his littermates who were also at the shelter. Is the “first puppy” theory a solid one? Not that it really matters as we are currently going thru round three of adolescence. But I am forever trying to get inside our dog’s mind…and hoping to stave off any potential aggression. But mostly just want our boy to live a long and happy dog life!!

My little Vallhund Erik was something of a mixture of Mico and Hope when he was a pup. He could not bare another dog playing with his big brother and would bark and run around trying to butt in. Thankfully, he learnt over time that he can have fun without Kivi as well as with Kivi. When we go to parks he doesn’t mind Kivi playing with other dogs usually. The barking and circling comes up when he gets super over-aroused, though.

I’ve always thought of Erik as a “world is my oyster” kind of dog. I get the distinct impression he is constantly analysing things in his environment seeking to answer one particular question: “How can this benefit Erik?” In his constant efforts to find ways to bend his environment to his advantage, he tends to try some outrageously pushy and obnoxious behaviour. That’s what he does. He tries things out. It’s great fun for clicker training, but keeps us all on our toes any other time! I’ve never seen him be quite as forward with other dogs as Mico was in the video, but I think that’s more because he’s a herder and he doesn’t like wrestling with strange dogs than anything else. I pretty much assume he will try anything sooner or later to see if it results in any benefits for Erik. I am almost certain he has some sense of what is wildly obnoxious behaviour, because he rarely persists with it if he doesn’t get rewarded once or twice. It’s almost like he expects it not to work, but just thought he should try just in case. He is notorious for lurking underneath dogs receiving treats, sitting like a perfect angel, but then leaping up to snatch the treat from unsuspecting mouths or hands at the very last moment. So wicked! But you have to admire his cleverness for figuring out a way to steal treats when most dogs are content with the sit and wait method once they learn it. Erik learnt it, too, but Erik isn’t content with the status quo. Erik has to continue testing to see if there’s a better way.

I wonder if Mico has something of this in him? I label it proactivity and opportunism in Erik. He is always pushing the envelope (proactive) and is so fast to take advantage of favourable results from that pushing (opportunistic). Lucky he is thoroughly charming. We had to get into the habit of very strict NILIF just in the interests of putting a lid on the myriad ways Erik would try in a just few seconds to get what he wants. You have to give Erik a box to work within (“here, these are the behaviours that will get you things you want”), or else it’s pure chaos all the time.

It would be great if you posted other videos like this and helped us to analyze them! Thanks very much — also for your consideration in making sure you had things to post while you were on your trip to New Zealand! Have a wonderful and safe trip!

What I find fascinating with a dog like Mico is the difference the personality of the older playmate makes in the development of the adult personality. I notice that Mico does repeatedly assume dominant positions over Willie, but Willie never really corrects him.

We were out once with our two Corgis and ran into a doggie-friend, an ultra-submissive yellow lab female who both my Corgis adore. With her was an adolescent female pitt bull/lab mix.

The lab and the mix play together regularly. The pitt-mix is very pushy and socially clueless and runs over and into other dogs repeatedly, and the submissive lab just tolerates (and therefore rewards) the behavior.

My rather submissive girl tried to snark off the pitt-mix several times, for running over the top of her, and got ignored. As the mix barreled towards my more dominant male Corgi, I commented to one of the owners “Well, Jack puts up with almost anything from other dogs” and just as I said it, Jack turned and gave a VERY loud growl-bark over his shoulder at her.

The pitt-mix changed path in mid-leap (despite easily being double the weight of Jack). From that point on, she continued running over the other two dogs but made a point of not walloping Jack any more (though she did play a chase-game with him).

I do think that frequently another dog can teach an adolescent pup in two seconds what a human handler might not teach in months of careful training.

When Jack himself was a pup, her frequently greeted other dogs by leaping on their heads. When he was very young, most other dogs tolerated it. When he hit about 8 months old, he got told off by his elders twice and the behavior immediately stopped. I had tried in vain to teach him more appropriate greeting habits.

In raising a puppy, access to confident, STABLE older dogs is a benefit that cannot be overstated, in my opinion. A confident and stable adult will tolerate most things from a very young puppy, but as soon as the sex hormones start to develop, they are likely to tell a pushy pup in no uncertain terms that it is time for him/her to start minding manners.

it looks to me, when willie and mico are playing like when you see an older dog playing with a puppy in the pack-pretty innocent. but the puppy, mico, keeps trying to give “hugs” to willie, which is a dominance display. i’m not sure, but i think he’s just testing it out in play and willie doesn’t seem too threatened by it. sometimes it seems like mico is going for willie’s mouth submissively, but then decides at the last second to go for the “hug”. at one point, after mico “hugs” willie, mico gives a compliant “shake” which means “okay i’m ready to listen to you”. but does continue to go after willie in between wrestling with hope.

hope and mico seem to be working out who’s over who. on the one hand, again it seems to me that puppy is playing out where he stands over hope, but definitely trying to go for the higher position. it seems kinda of mean that mico keeps taking full advantage of being over hope and going straight for the belly/genitals. i believe that mico’s tail is straight up for the whole video-also quite dominant. but i also think it’s clear that hope doesn’t want mico “hugging” willie.

assuming that hope is a girl, i can see her being the controlling alpha female in this situation. usually though, males always let the females win in play though, so that’s a bit confusing as far as how mico seems to react to hope if mico is a boy, which i think you said he is.

Thank you for that link! I was especially interested in the busting of the 50/50 myth; my own observation is that one dog in a play pair generally wins a large proportion of the time, though a smart and social dog who is clearly more dominant may tone it down considerably to keep the game going. So in wrestling bouts, my male wins much more often then my female, but he has learned over time to not win quite so dramatically in order to keep the game going longer. He realized that standing on top of he and mouthing her throat in triumph made for a very short game, since he is stronger and bigger and can pin her in a very short time if he so desires.

My male much prefers to be the chaser than the chasee, and it took him about a year to finally figure out that my female would not, under any circumstances, EVER be the chasee. Therefore, with her and her alone he will be the chasee, but with all other dogs he is either the chaser or does not play the game.

I wanted to add that the chase rule is so firm that if they are running in circles and Jack laps Maddie and comes up behind her (therefore becoming the chasee by default) he will turn around and go the other way to keep her happily running after him.

Thanks for the link to Camille’s article, Tracy, good work. If readers are interested, I also summarized some of her work in a blog on October 22nd, 2008 and there are some interesting comments there too. Play is such a great topic, isn’t it? So fun and frolicsome, and yet so important, and sometimes… serious business.

LD wants to play with Willie because Hope is “too much” for him – plays a little too rough. So LD is trying to engage Willie.

Hope wants to play with the LD because of the novelty of it and because he’s more bouncy and energetic than Willie, so he’s just grabbing on and knocking him off Willie to try to engage play. But LD is overwhelmed by Hope so concentrates on Willie instead.

Looks just like Ronja the hound mix playing with herding dogs when she was young: Bringing down the prey vs. circling and running. Hope seems to be very able to play both ways.

Yup, Ronja play back then, right down to biting down too hard towards the end. That part went away when she learned how to play with very small dogs who didn’t put up with any of that rough behavior and would teach her by either yelping and snapping at her or – worse – stopping to play with her altogether.

She still doesn’t get it why her herding dog friends always bark at her when trying to play…

It’s been great to read all the comments. I’m Mico’s owner, and I appreciate the fact that so many of Trisha’s readers have been so perceptive in analyzing his behavior. I agree entirely with so many of you who said some version of Lauren’s comment that “that puppy is a hand (paw) full!” He certainly is! He is also, thankfully, very, very sweet with people, and he is quite receptive to being redirected when he starts to get too aroused. I also agree with Beth’s comment that having a stable adult dog to do some appropriate correction is essential. When Willie was a youngster, he used to do some inappropriate greetings to other dogs. At Trisha’s request, I brought my big (75 pound) golden/bc (probably) male, Baern, over to Trisha’s house. It took one deep growl-snap at Willie and Will learned that ignoring that big dog instead of jumping on him was the best policy. Baern used to specialize in “putting down puppies” who didn’t play appropriately. He would use his big paws to pin them on the ground if they didn’t respond to verbal warnings. He never hurt any of them–no teeth ever made contact, but he was persuasive. For one particular stubborn yellow lab bitch puppy, he actually took her whole head in his mouth and growled when she jumped on him for the third time. That must have been an interesting experience for her! He was such a calm, yet assertive dog that he taught quite a few puppies how to be respectful. He is 14 years old now, arthritic and mostly blind, so although he doesn’t take any nonsense from Mico, he’s not as effective as he used to be, since he just can’t move fast enough to discipline Mico effectively. We help him out by reinforcing his “lessons” with our own low growly voices and body blocking when Mico gets too nippy with him. Mico never exhibits the kind of disrespectful behavior with Baern that he did with Will, so perhaps Baern is teaching him manners after all. Thank you very much for the vote of confidence, Trisha! I’m glad you think I’m doing a good job with Mico! The classes at Dogs Best Friend have been great for exposing him to rooms full of other dogs that he’s not allowed to play with. That’s helping him to learn how to watch and listen, but not interact. He’s just like a little kid. He needs to learn that his every wish will not be immediately gratified–including his urge to play–and that he can deal with the resulting frustration in positive ways. Thanks again for all the comments! I’ve learned a lot from reading them!

To add to Kathy’s observations: One of the problems with Willie and Hope is that Willie never ever corrected Hope for being rude, and Hope got ruder and ruder with him. Willie can be super controlling in some contexts, but a total wuss in others….. Ah, the value of a benevolent elder (which Hope now has, and is soooooo good for him.)

And on another note: made it to LA! So glad we’re not getting on a 3rd plane for a 13 hour plane ride to Auckland. We leave for NZ tomorrow, taking a break in the trip. Leaving Willie was excruciating,worse than I thought it would be. Should brought an anxiety wrap and used it for myself….

I know I’m late to the game, but was Hope muzzle punching Mico every time he tried to break them up? It looked like he wasn’t just pushing in between Willie and Mico, but actually slamming his muzzle into Mico. Did I see that correctly?

And I’m the proud owner of a 5 y/o female pit bull who was removed from mom too young and really just has never learned how to be socially appropriate. I had her around appropriate older dogs when she was a puppy, but she just never learned from their corrections! I’d end up stepping in to stop it from going south quickly after one too many corrections and Inara took it personally.

I’ve begun finding a couple other dogs (always pit bulls!) that will play with her. I just have to make sure it’s a dog that also enjoys the body slamming/chasing/hip checking/taking turns mounting type of play that Inara does. She plays rough, and mounts and other “status-seeking” stuff, but then she’ll turn around and encourage the other dog to try to mount her and climb on her. All’s fair in love and pit bulls!

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Patricia B. McConnell, PhD, CAAB is an applied animal behaviorist who has been working with, studying, and writing about dogs for over twenty-five years. She encourages your participation, believing that your voice adds greatly to its value. She enjoys reading every comment, and adds her own responses when she can.

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